Susan's Place Transgender Resources

The decision to transition and drastically change your life is difficult to say the least . How important is the factor of whether or not you'll have a partner present or future on the determination of moving forward and transitioning. For myself it didn't weigh in too much because I lost hope along time ago in ever finding anyone so it didn't matter.

For me personally, transitioning is something that I needed to do in order to be happy with myself. If I had been in a relationship at the time and they couldn't understand that, the relationship would end. I don't really care about future partners, it didn't factor into my decision at all.

I believe that whoever is meant to be in your life will find their way to you. I'd want to be the best version of myself that I could possibly be for whoever that person is, and to be that, I needed to transition.

Truthfully it has weighed on me a lot.

I'm married (to a woman) but it is unlikely to last from all indications.

And I am straight probably slightly bi/pansexual. So I may want to have relations with a guy when I'm all done.

But I am afraid of transphobia and acceptance. WIll they accept me in spite of being trans? It's hard to go stealth for me but even if I could, I wouldn't feel right or honest lying or lying by omission to an intimate partner.

I am not looking for someone who is specifically interested in trans women as a fetish. I'm not going to have man parts when I'm done anyway.

But that is not a deciding factor. My deciding factor is not wanting to kill myself, and not constantly being depressed and sick.

oh geez. you know, wish i had a partner who would be there when i need them and help me through but i'm content with not having one if it means i'll be slated

It's big for me but only recently. I don't trust women. I worry they'll either miss the penis and leave me for that, or they'll secretly fetishize my hated parts and use me as liberal brownie points ("oh, I dated a transgender lol I'm so open minded").

But it would never be enough to make me detransition. You can be surrounded by people and loved, but still feel completely and utterly alone. And that's how I felt as a woman and as a non-passing trans man. People found me attractive and I had lots of people who thought I was "cool." But I felt so alone because I knew despite their best intentions they couldn't see past the outside. I ditched almost everyone except the few true blue friends who did all they could to ignore the lies of my outward appearance...and frankly, I am better off without everyone I walked away from because although I wasn't physically alone those people made me feel alone, trapped in my skin. Detransitioning might make it easier to get a date, but I would know I wasn't being seen or loved for myself and there would be no point.

Besides that, real love is not so fickle. Being trans might make casual dating harder, because unfortunately, I place very high expectations on others in terms of understanding my transition. I've been hurt too many times by people who only half ass know what they're talking about, even other trans people have done this. So when someone doesn't "get it" enough for me, I don't care to continue the relationship/friendship, because I've been through too much to do that again. But I know that someone who REALLY loves me, when they find out about my past - they're going to find a way to accept me exactly as I am, without fetishizing me, making assumptions about me, etc because they're going to see that in spite of my challenges I am a man worth loving. Who respects how I feel about myself and lets me tell her who I am, not the other way around. I'll find that woman one day, providing that I can allow myself to take a risk and trust her.

Honestly, I could say "Transition is just for yourself", "All that matters is how you feel about yourself" which I feel is true. But, I won't lie, finding a partner is important for me, and I'm 18 and young and apparently femmie so it's very hard. Aside from body dysphoria, this is probably just one of the many reasons that push even forward to transition. Gay and bi guys don't like femme at all. There are probably more straight guys willing to date a trans girl than gay guys after a femme boy. Seriously. Even if it's just a minority of the hetero community, any hetero minority is still bigger than a gay minority. I feel like no gay would date me, eva, as I'm to femme for their tastes. YET, I don't have a woman's body so no hetero guy would either! OMG It's frustrating, it's like being stuck in a limbo. So, yeah. Yeah........It's one of the big reasons for me. I feel like it's tabboo to admit this, but it's true for me.

Quote from: Auroramarianna on April 17, 2015, 03:00:02 PM
Honestly, I could say "Transition is just for yourself", "All that matters is how you feel about yourself" which I feel is true. But, I won't lie, finding a partner is important for me, and I'm 18 and young and apparently femmie so it's very hard. Aside from body dysphoria, this is probably just one of the many reasons that push even forward to transition. Gay and bi guys don't like femme at all. There are probably more straight guys willing to date a trans girl than gay guys after a femme boy. Seriously. Even if it's just a minority of the hetero community, any hetero minority is still bigger than a gay minority. I feel like no gay would date me, eva, as I'm to femme for their tastes. YET, I don't have a woman's body so no hetero guy would either! OMG It's frustrating, it's like being stuck in a limbo. So, yeah. Yeah........It's one of the big reasons for me. I feel like it's tabboo to admit this, but it's true for me.

omg! i know the feeling though i'm neither feminine or masculine. actually i just feel like one big contraindication sometimes. its strange

To me, I feel that I need to transition before  even considering shopping for a new boyfriend. I have had other guys in the past but it just doesn't feel right. Like there is something missing in the relationship and it is because I don't feel like a complete woman.

sometimes i wonder if i would actually end up dying alone in a house full of cats. i'm like average, i'm a crazy magnet and i've really never had a "normal" relationship. i guess really for me, it does matter in some sense cuz i feel kinda lonely. (runs to a corner, rolls into a ball and cries)

Quote from: DanielleA on April 17, 2015, 09:03:17 PM
To me, I feel that I need to transition before  even considering shopping for a new boyfriend. I have had other guys in the past but it just doesn't feel right. Like there is something missing in the relationship and it is because I don't feel like a complete woman.

That's my problem , I love men and want a man to hold me so bad , but I don't feel right because I'm not complete

Quote from: Echo Alcestis on April 17, 2015, 09:08:01 PM
sometimes i wonder if i would actually end up dying alone in a house full of cats. i'm like average, i'm a crazy magnet and i've really never had a "normal" relationship. i guess really for me, it does matter in some sense cuz i feel kinda lonely. (runs to a corner, rolls into a ball and cries)

yes, loneliness seems to be my lover.

Quote from: stephaniec on April 17, 2015, 09:12:17 PM
yes, loneliness seems to be my lover.

well i have left over ice cream. you want? i'll just go watch reruns of giligan's island  :'(

I had already given up on relationships, love and all that stuff about 11 years before I started transitioning, so it wasn't a factor at all for me.

Sometimes I feel that my need for a boyfriend is so strong it hurts. It's really annoying actually. That being said, I'm a straight girl, not a gay boy, and so social transition was imperative anyway.

maybe if i change my look it could help. i could go either way, but i prefer girls. it takes a special guy to attract me. oh loneliness, why art thou so cruel.

Quote from: Echo Alcestis on April 17, 2015, 09:25:27 PM
well i have left over ice cream. you want? i'll just go watch reruns of giligan's island  :'(

if it's cherry

Quote from: Echo Alcestis on April 17, 2015, 09:48:20 PM
maybe if i change my look it could help. i could go either way, but i prefer girls. it takes a special guy to attract me. oh loneliness, why art thou so cruel.

Well, I go either way , but my problem is I love men , but not without the proper equipment

After all I've been through in my life, I just don't think I can BE a proper partner without transition.  So yeah, if I end up completely alone and transitioned, I think I'd be better off this way than being a bad partner. 

0 %, as they are different and mostly unrelated matters to me.

How sad that many of us transgender people are lonely wether it is by choice for self preservation/protection or uncertainties or by no choice of our own.. people just detesting us or reviled in fear of our difference from them as they perceive it. Heh, if only people had open hearts and minds to us we'd have more of an equal opportunity to experience the(largely overlooked by others who do not struggle as we do) simple joy of having that meaningful and deep bond of love with another. I have never had a lover in all my years of living and that GREATLY floods me with sorrow in my heart. The loneliness of it all as of around 2 years ago really started getting to me.

:sigh: .... how I would love to have a strong, caring, handsome man to make me feel loved, protected, and cherished. I'd be a great woman to my man he'd not regret having me by any means. I do feel in my soul that I will end up meeting the love of my life when the time is right though. I'm planning on going full-time within a year and a half and I'm sure to be beautiful and that's when I'm entering the dating scene to find my knight. Yes, I know I am very weak sounding and I guess I am...  sadly but that's just how things ended up.

I needed to be a woman. That overrode all concerns about finding a partner. I figured I look at the partner situation once I got there.

It's been rough, but I know many, many trans people who have found a loving partner, so I keep holding out hope.

I'm doing this under duress. My neck is being massaged. Mmm

And he can see what I post.

I wasn't looking for a realtionship, it just happened.

Sometimes when you don't look you find.

Aww, that's great for you Cindy! When did you meet your love if you don't mind my asking?


By the way Australia looks so gorgeous would love to visit the country when I enter the traveling hobbie later in life.

It has 0% for me - fortunately (or unfortunately?) I wasn't in a relationship anyway so it hasn't had an impact in that regard. I've only ever been in a relationship for a total of one year so by and large I have lived alone. If I find someone great, if I don't then it's the same old same old. :P

Quote from: ClaireIvene on April 18, 2015, 05:04:09 AM
Aww, that's great for you Cindy! When did you meet your love if you don't mind my asking?


By the way Australia looks so gorgeous would love to visit the country when I enter the traveling hoppy later in life.

At an Art exibition. i was stunned about a piece of rubbsh that was presented, a guy asked me what I thought about it, I told him it was infantile crap. He was the artist. He asked me out for dinner since he thought I was the only person who gave an honest opinion.

The rest. History.

I came to Australia from the UK, alone. I had to walk my path, Australia was a long way from my family and my past. Enough said.


It s a great place. Nice people, accepting and I'm happy here.

Quote from: Cindy on April 18, 2015, 05:25:59 AM
...I told him it was infantile crap...

(https://www.susans.org/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fboots.scene7.com%2Fis%2Fimage%2FBoots%2F10057360%3Fwid%3D280%26amp%3Bhei%3D343%26amp%3Bop_sharpen%3D1&hash=d9c03cbb8338f29b807b4c6372b16c5c59c69f68)

;D ;D ;D

Hahahaha! Nice story Cindy! Well, at least there ain't going to be no 'honesty' issues in your relationship... but seriously that's too much...


You: 'Man this person is a HORRIBLE artist, geez!'

Him: 'you think so, lets go out for dinner, eh... I like honesty.'

sorry just had to do my own little rendition for laughs.

My take on this issue is a bit completely the wrong way around, but may still be on topic.

Finding a (female) partner has always been something I felt I needed, but for reasons I may never understand it just did not happen. From my experience I had reason to assume I would stay alone for the rest of my life.
The more serious I became about my transition, the more I realized that I could be much happier living as a single woman than I could ever be as a single man.

The feeling that not having a partner would be more bearable if I would live in the role and body of a woman is what influenced me (among many other things, of course) in my decision.

One unintended but highly welcome result is that I may find someone after all if I am not careful now :o .
HRT, coming out and going full time have had a positive impact on myself I would never have anticipated, and I find it to be so much easier now to get close to other people. Because of that, sometimes I wonder whether I could have found happiness without transitioning if I could have changed like that while keeping my male shell. But the truth is that I know the cause for that effect, and there would have been no other way to get there.

Quote from: Auroramarianna on April 17, 2015, 03:00:02 PM
Honestly, I could say "Transition is just for yourself", "All that matters is how you feel about yourself" which I feel is true. But, I won't lie, finding a partner is important for me, and I'm 18 and young and apparently femmie so it's very hard. Aside from body dysphoria, this is probably just one of the many reasons that push even forward to transition. Gay and bi guys don't like femme at all. There are probably more straight guys willing to date a trans girl than gay guys after a femme boy. Seriously. Even if it's just a minority of the hetero community, any hetero minority is still bigger than a gay minority. I feel like no gay would date me, eva, as I'm to femme for their tastes. YET, I don't have a woman's body so no hetero guy would either! OMG It's frustrating, it's like being stuck in a limbo. So, yeah. Yeah........It's one of the big reasons for me. I feel like it's tabboo to admit this, but it's true for me.

You nailed it.

I get more "action" from bisexual guys... all my boyfriends were bisexual or strictly top gay men.

I have more flirtation with straight (desperate) guys than gay guys.... as a slightly fem guy. Supply//Demand.

I said 0-20%. I'm married and hope to stay that way. I love my Sweetie! However, I was quickly becoming nonfunctional. When I realized that I'm trans it became clear that I either wouldn't survive much longer, she would divorce me for the rages testosterone was causing, or I'd move into a new residence without her (a psych ward).

Well, I answered according to having had a "present" partner; I hope that's OK.

Losing my wife was the thing that scared me most about transition, and I would have tried desperately to stay a guy if that was the price. (I don't think I would have succeeded long-term, but I would have tried.) Fortunately, and I'm still grateful for her, we're still happily together now 5+ years post-transition.

i actually have to be honest. for me, loneliness is my biggies illness. if i can cut the loneliness out, than i'd finally stabilize completely. i tend to bark and bite which scares people away, in turn causes me to isolate myself away even further. so if i do transition, to complete the process, i'd actually really need to find a partner who really isnt scared of my bark or my bite. i guess you can say i'm one of those people who can't do anything by themselves. sure family and friends are great but nothing comes close to actually waking up and having someone else there just smiling at you while you were sleeping. just thinking about it sends shivers down my spine but also makes me wanna cry

Well, it doesn't change who I am or what I want out of life, so it didnt factor in my transition that much.  The truth is dating as a gay man would be much easier, at least less complicated.  Like most people, I want to one day have a family,  just differently from what was expected of me.  I'm a bit pessimistic that will happen, but you never know.   However,  you can't lie to yourself or pretend to be something you're not to find a partner.   I dont think that's fair to anyone involved.   But yeah, I will admit its a concern of mine and something I wonder about while not fully transitioned.

having a partner and people who wanna date me is very important to me...and having that as a gay guy is just not what I want...if nobody liked me after I transitioned I don't know what I would do but thabkfully its been the opposite...no one wanted me as a femme gay boy but now its a lot easier

Quote from: birkin on April 17, 2015, 02:58:13 PMI don't trust women. I worry they'll either miss the penis and leave me for that, or they'll secretly fetishize my hated parts and use me as liberal brownie points ("oh, I dated a transgender lol I'm so open minded").

Are your views regarding women just things you're afraid of, or has it actually happened to you?  Cause there's lots of women who would be OK dating a trans guy.  Like me...no, it's not an offer!  I've got a trans girlfriend.  But even when I was still Mormon and thought I was hetero, I would have been fine with dating a trans guy.

Quote from: birkin on April 17, 2015, 02:58:13 PMI'll find that woman one day, providing that I can allow myself to take a risk and trust her.

Ever considered talking to a counselor about those trust issues?

Quote from: Auroramarianna on April 17, 2015, 03:00:02 PMI feel like no gay would date me, eva, as I'm to femme for their tastes. YET, I don't have a woman's body so no hetero guy would either! OMG It's frustrating, it's like being stuck in a limbo.

I am a cisgender gal and seem to be mostly into women, and my girlfriend is still pretransition.  Don't assume a guy wouldn't want you just cause you don't look like the average girl.  ;)

Neither my girlfriend nor I were really looking for a relationship. It just happened.

0%

I've had relationships in the past and I would like to in the future as well but transitioning is far more important to me. The prospect of future relationships etc didn't even cross my mind before I came out and was only something I thought about when someone questioned me about it soon after I did.

I have to disqualify myself on the poll. "Finding" is not my problem, "Keeping" is.

Much of my past life, the era in my 20's when I twice "experimented" with transition is a blur. I doubt that a life partner was on a priority list. Surviving, No, 1.

Humans are social creatures. We need that contact outside of ourselves to survive. I doubt I'd survive without my BFF, soul-mate and reality therapist. I know that is she left me, either by walking out or checking out; I'd be devastated, be self destructive, and .... Been there once before with an ex.

Being trans I've always been a very private person. To open up to ANYONE meant exposing yourself to hatred. Forget ridicule. Being a former fatty I can handle that. Fat jokes were nothing compared compared to the giggles, or worse, heard during my previous experiments with transition.

So, in a sense "having" a life partner is VERY important for me. This world is too grand of a place to experience it alone. One set of eyes is hardly enough.

In the short term, not necessary. The long term, however, I would like to have a partner that I can be my real self around. Could be either male or female. I'm starting to get lonely and jealous of one my friends who has a girlfriend.

I've been married longer than I've been aware of my transgender status.  I spent a while being ashamed and hiding things from her until I absolutely had to tell or burst... but now I'm sharing every little detail that I learn about HRT, etc., and she's gotta be on board before I do anything.  She doesn't have veto power since it's my body, but I need her to have a hand in the decision-making, since I want her to be comfortable with it.  We meant our vows, and it never ceases to amaze me how much this process is reaffirming that.

Sparrow, I really like your way of looking at it, and I'm in a very similar position.  I answered 100% on the survey, because I'm married and keeping my wife on board is one of the biggest factors in what I would consider a successful transition...for me.

Honestly, the standard trans narrative that prepares us for the utter and total rejection of everyone we've ever known or loved (which isn't true anymore), is one of the things that kept me from transitioning in my early 20's.  I figured that coming out would be an automatic death sentence for my marriage.  But it's just not true.  A recent survey showed that roughly half of all serious relationships do survive transition.  And from my anecdotal experience, I've found that to be pretty accurate.  Keeping my wife on board is still far from a sure thing...but by treating her as a partner in the process, I have a much better chance of keeping it together.

Another 0%er here.. I know there is someone out there and she won't have been the first.

To be honest I am getting loads more interest from people now, than the old me ever did!

Mind you, I suppose old-me had the appearance of a football hooligan, and the personality of a giggly girl ... not very congruent :~D

I hope I can find a companion     , but I'm quite happy  changing into a butterfly

My choice to transition was made with the full knowledge that a transwomen my age was going to have very low odds of finding an accepting man. But I don't need a man in my life to get by. It would be great, and I'd love it if it happens, but I am learning to be happy with and as myself. And nobody can take that away from me, whether or not I'm lucky enough to have a partner for the rest of my life.

I went with 50%, but not really because it makes or breaks a transition. It's a few things.

I guess I kind of used relationships as an anchor to keep me from transitioning. With each new relationship, I was able to keep the trans part of me at bay less and less. The last one was on the back burner for less than a week. That's when I realized a transition was imminent.

I've always known relationships were a lost cause for me, but with the transition on the horizon, it makes me think that doesn't have to be the case, so now instead of being an anchor to keep me away from a transition, it's something to look forward to during and/or after.

Quote from: sparrow on April 19, 2015, 11:10:32 PM
I've been married longer than I've been aware of my transgender status.  I spent a while being ashamed and hiding things from her until I absolutely had to tell or burst... but now I'm sharing every little detail that I learn about HRT, etc., and she's gotta be on board before I do anything.  She doesn't have veto power since it's my body, but I need her to have a hand in the decision-making, since I want her to be comfortable with it.  We meant our vows, and it never ceases to amaze me how much this process is reaffirming that.

That works if your partner accepts, but in my case she said she is not a lesbian and won't accept no way no how. Betrayal is how she put it, even up to this day. But if you have an accepting partner, by all means.

It would be nice to have a future partner but it is not first on my list.

Angelgrl

Quote from: iKate on April 21, 2015, 12:53:30 PM
That works if your partner accepts, but in my case she said she is not a lesbian and won't accept no way no how. Betrayal is how she put it, even up to this day. But if you have an accepting partner, by all means.

Accepting partner privilege?  Yes, I've got it.  I do now, anyway.  It took 2 years before we could have a conversation about it where I didn't come out scarred.  And that is far from a sure thing even today.

My wife "isn't a lesbian" too.  I'm "the exceptional girl".   The distinction sounds thin to some... but we all know how much it hurts to be mislabeled.